Born Again (Verse)
by Foolscapping
Summary: "Castiel goes to Hell to retrieve Sam, but things don't go as planned." AU of 5.22, technically, or of 6.01. Warnings inside.
1. Prelude

**Authors Note:** This'll be the first real chapter story I've done for SPN, and I'm a little nervous! But I got the idea in my head and it wouldn't suffice as a short story, so I'm gonna give it my best. Dean and Castiel will be major POVs for a while, though I may bring in other characters or outside POV. Let me know if you like! I'd love to gauge if this is a storyline people would enjoy.

**Warnings: **Sad stuff from the Cage, pain, misery, mild gore and dark themes, the usual. There may be other warnings for later chapters, and I'll warn for them on each update should they crop up. There's a lot of Sam whump as well! Aaaaand some unpleasant mental/emotional pain for a child in the story, so if little kids hurting (especially mentally or emotionally) makes you uncomfortable, might wanna skip out on this 'verse.

**Summary:** Castiel flies to retrieve Sam from the Cage - but when he flees with Sam, something goes horribly awry.

* * *

Prelude: Perdition/Salvation

* * *

_This is all wrong. This is not how it was supposed to be. _

* * *

It is one year after the apocalypse that never happened, and he has been busy.

Castiel claws through darkness and grit and blood, celestial wings clenched against his back so that he dare not gorge them on jagged bone and metal and a palpable despair. The further down he clamors, the more sour the air is around his aura - which is a beacon, he knows, his light shining in a world that slowly compacts him, makes him feel smaller, _weaker_. He doesn't have much time. He needs to find him, before his brothers realize he's lurking, trespassing in their new jail cell. It's so hard to navigate, so hard to comb through and look for his friend's small and nearly insignificant glow—tiny and flickering, expanding in and out like a strangled series of breaths. In the large and daunting space, there is ice (so cold that he feels it even without a body, chilled to the core), there is a fiery precipice, and there is—Sam. He reaches out, wraps himself around Sam, is terrified and pained for a moment at how frail and thin and wispy the man's soul is next to him, like a string woven around a fingertip in comparison. The soul shivers and moans, and the softest brush of grace against it rips a vicious scream of energy through the Cage.

_'Sam, what have they done to you?'_

_'...Cas...?'_

They would not have much time.

Castiel finds Sam's body not too far from the soul, or at least what remains of it: clumped, rotting, unrecognizable as human. He doesn't know what to do completely; he needs Sam's body alive again. This isn't a broken neck like with Bobby, he thinks, this isn't a shattered cheekbone like Dean's. But even at the hollowed, angry whisper of Enochian traversing the distance (Lucifer, Michael, they've noticed something's wrong), Castiel scoops organs and bone fragments into his centuries-long fingers and begins to frantically stitch together carved up muscle, skin, hair. A face forms, looking dead and gone, once hazel eyes glazed over. Arms, legs. The chest extends as the ribs snap back into place. Sam's body. There is no time—he has to go, and go now. _'Cas,' _Sam's soul pours out (Enochian, Sam is speaking _Enochian_),_'Cas, Cas, please; don't leave me, god, destroy me; it hurts so much'_. The words are fragmented and clumsy. Castiel knows there's no time, but he holds the soul and lets his own light warm it; it's so cold, practically ice under his protection. Puffs of white frost trail after them. _It's okay, my friend, I'm here,_ he replies. He collects the weeping soul and the motionless corpse and starts back up the bedcrumb trail his grace had ghosted behind him. He ascends, and he almost can't find the willpower to reach the living. Sam's essence is clinging to him like a child, soul burrowing fingers in deep, but Castiel doesn't expect the soft begging to be _'If they find us, throw me back down; don't get dragged down with me'_. He simply clasps himself around Sam a little more intently. If he should fail and get dragged into the dark, it's not something that's about to slow him down now, and he will not throw Sam away, would never have been able to discard the image of his soul drifting back down into the endless black sea like a leaf.

He hastens, moving too fast to comprehend, time and space bowing out of the way on his behalf.

And then he flickers into life again, rather anticlimactically.

It's done.

It's done, and all he needs to do is mend whatever is left of the man's half-gnarled life.

He supposes it should be easy. An angel who can mend a body; putting a soul into flesh should not be an issue. They were made for each other, after all. Were they not? Most souls knew where they belonged. Sam's is no doubt damaged, torn and ravaged and broken, but it is still shining brightly. It's still Sam, and Sam is capable of much more than anyone had _ever _anticipated. He could do this. He has to do this. And so when he rises up (his trenchcoat molted with dry blood and mud and ash) and stands beneath the yellowed flicker of a streetlamp, he's already prepared to make his friend whole again. As if God, he could mend him, make him new.

His confusion grows at the bundle clasped in his arms, too small and too delicate to be anything he had dragged out of Hell. The rags are the clothes Sam had fallen in at Stull Cemetery, that was to be sure. The soul keens and cries and wails, and then the body keens and cries and wails, and for a moment Castiel is a larger-than-life entity with a thought screeching into silence. He curls his fingers in the foul-smelling fabric and a soft head of hair greets him; it's thin hair, very thin, and the dark eyes that squint up at him are full of tears, and they dribble down the infant's face. A hand full of fat, small fingers grab at his fingertips, and instantly he compares it to Sam's soul curling around him.

... _Sam_.

_This child is Sam._

Fear grips him before he can process the ramifications of such an epiphany. He's never held a human child, but he is aware that they are eggshells in his grip, that even the smallest mistake can hurt them. He adjusts and tries to burrow into Jimmy's mind for a memory of normalcy, and eventually he finds the muscle memory to at least cradle the weeping baby in the crease of his arm. The sobbing baby has a keloid burn the shape of Castiel's fingers on his leg. "No—how? How is this..." he starts, and Sam's cries scald him, pierce his heart to the core. There isn't anything wrong with this child; this is Sam Winchester, breathing and alive, birthed again by brimstone in the dark. But he feels it. The soul there, straining beneath a dirty little chest, heavy and too large and too burdened in a very small, very delicate rib cage.

This child—his friend—is suffering.

Castiel is torn, and he tries to awkwardly rock the boy and calm him. He feels he's probably not doing a well enough job, and even if he had, it was obvious that Sam was aching in ways he couldn't fix right now. "It's alright, Sam. It's—It's alright." When he looks around the deserted moonlit street, just a filthy angel holding a filthy little body, he finds himself lost.

_This was not how it was supposed to be._


	2. Ramble On

**Author's Notes: **I ended up accidentally losing half the chapter, haha. But it's re-written and here you go! Just to note, this is a deviation from S6-S9, so none of those will likely ever be happening in this verse. Castiel won't be going God-mode and he'll be a regular as a disgruntled angel dealing with heaven. The next chapter may include a Lisa POV, as I like her character a ton (despite her horrible taste in helping unhealthy men, bless her heart). Also note the warnings: there's a child in pain here, and it's by no means a fluffy, comfortable story or chapter in general. You've been warned! Nothing too severe in this chapter, of course. I'll let you know if anything major happens.

* * *

Dean _tries_.

He'd attempted to find ways to drag his little brother out of the darkness, of course, but in-between random bursts of research and demon-hunting, he'd kept his end of things: tried to move on, tried to make a life, tried not to drink himself into a brutal hangover too often (well, that last one was more for Lisa's sake than Sam's, Sam doesn't get to say how much Dean fucking drinks because he's not here with that doe-eyed stare or that stubborn jawline). Feels like a phantom limb, that he's amputated something and it hurts every second of every day to think of that arm rotting away in a not-so-shallow grave beneath his feet. Lisa's found him before in the very early days, completely out of it with a bottle clasped in his hand, rasping, _'He's right under us, y'know. He's fucking down there, Lis.' _And then she had pried the bottle from his clenched white fingers and ushered him into bed, and they'd have sex - comfort sex, if there's ever a fucking thing, where she'd take his pliant body and trail his jaw with kisses, given his drunken mind something else to focus on for just a few minutes. Or at least the extra push toward unpleasant black-out sleep, lethargy crossing into complete and utter exhaustion.

After a few nights of that, he'd made a conscious effort not to get completely wasted; not like it _really _helps to get hammered. Just makes him not care enough to blubber and mourn. For every shot, Sam is still in the dark. Probably screaming for help. For every breath Dean inhales, Sam will be mutilated. He paces on the worst days, tries not to relate it to his own take in Hell. Sammy's been down there for a year. That's 100 years. 100 down, eternity to go. _Eternity_. The guilt of what he'd done to _Sam _years ago, to make him endure this same agony, it's a lot on him. He should have never brought Sam back, not like he did, not if it meant this own unique torture. 100 years. That's how many days? A young Sam voice huffs 'there are 365.242 days in a year', and it comes out to over 36,500 days, and Dean ends up vomiting into a toilet and getting himself too sick to work. He's a sad mess, he _knows_.

It's a little better, lately. The drinking, the pacing, the thinking. Working a routine with his job and home-life: it helps. Of course, sometimes, he wants to rip into something supernatural way more often than Sam would've liked, and every so often he gives in to the want and runs off long enough to gank a vamp and come home like nothing ever happened; Lisa probably has ESP, because she looks at him like she _knows_. It's enough to keep him away from the hunts for a few months again; Lis and Ben didn't deserve this. Hell, Ben's a star kid for someone to help raise, and he needs to - he needs to give Ben whatever he can offer, because it sure wasn't enough for Sam. And when Ben asks to go to college in the future, Dean'll fucking drive him there and buy his books and tell him how fucking proud he is. Like you wouldn't believe. And then Ben would get a girlfriend, and maybe someday he'd propose to her, and he'd get a house and kids and a life.

And Dean would never take that from him.

Lately, he barbecues. He mows the lawn. He keeps track of Sam's days in Hell. He works, sleeps, eats. He tries to go out with his small, sweet family and sometimes he grins and laughs and even enjoys himself with familiar faces. Cries in private, calls in sick if he can't find the willpower to drag himself out of bed. Most days, he does it for Lisa and Ben and Sam, but some days it just isn't enough, and he hates that.

The night Castiel appears in his kitchen, the angel is covered in blood and he's holding a screaming bundle.

Dean is nursing a beer.

There's a moment of complete awe.

"Holy _fuck_, Cas, it's been— now you're abducting _babies_? What kind of weird-ass— "

"Dean, I'm sorry, I don't know what happened. But it is _Sam_. This is _Sam_. I tried..."

Dean doesn't even need to comprehend the situation for his stomach to twist, because _anyone _mentioning Sam is always a clump of lead sinking deep in his gut, but his hazel eyes track to the disgusting raggedly shirt, the light-colored head of baby hair at the crease of Castiel's arm, and—he gets angry. Sees red, jumps to his feet and gets in Castiel's face, baby be damned. "Don't you fucking say shit like that, you know where Sam is—" and all the while, the baby is screaming bloody murder, writhing in Castiel's grip, and Lisa's stumbling downstairs dragging on a robe and looking scared as hell; Dean isn't sure how to explain that this is his, oh, angel friend. From Heaven, Made By God. Who has been ignoring too many prayers and doing his own shit on the side. His head is spinning anyway, he can afford to be a little bitter.

Castiel rambles on, his own temper bleeding through his tone, "_Dean_, I raised Sam from the Cage. I think that the Pit's time and space must've done something; I've never raised a man on my own, and I... Look. Look at him, Dean. This is _Sam_. We need to feed him. He's—he needs sustenance."

Dean stares at Cas, red-faced. Fuck him for doing this. This must be a nightmare or something. Some sad bullshit his brain is concocting from nothing at all, and he'll wake up sweaty and miserable and needing to get up for work. Lisa's keeping her distance near the staircase, and the baby screams like someone is flaying it, and Dean finally looks down between him and the angel to this weeping infant. Lighter brown hair, wet bright eyes, lotta' gums and fat rolls. Memories from well over sixty years ago spring into his head, ones of fire and heat and his father yelling for him to take his brother and _run_. The beer must be playing tricks on him; he didn't drink enough for this. His eyes are playing tricks on him, and he can't afford to give into this depressingly desperate hope that suddenly tickles the inside of his stomach.

It clicks that this baby has been in his family photos; he's held him too many times, too close and personal; he's fed this kid, never would forget the face: at first a piece of his Mom he had to safeguard; one of the only things left of her. And then as the most important person Dean will ever have in his life.

His hands move on their own, feels like, and he scoops the bundle into his arms with careful precision. Cas stands with his arms fanned out like he's not quite sure what to do with them anymore, but his eyes are glued on Sam. Glued on the two of them as Dean goes ashen and cradles Sam's head in a palm. The nape of his neck. It's not that freakishly long giraffe neck, but it doesn't have to be for Dean to remember his brother. "... Sammy?" he breathes against the wails, brows beetling. The baby's scrunched face smooths just a little, his cries turn into strained breathing, and big hazel eyes stare back. Dean lifts him up, lets him lean vertical against his shoulder. He engulfs him with his arms. "Jesus. Sam. No fucking way."

"Sam?" Lisa asks. She steps up as she brushes her unruly hair back out of her face, eyes gleaming with nervousness. Dean looks at her, his own eyes swimming.

It's going to be a complicated night.

* * *

Lisa was more in her right mind than Dean tonight, and for that, Dean is eternally grateful; it's often times like these he wished he deserved her. While he's trying to calm a screaming infant, she's quick to grab the keys and head straight for the store, no questions, the panic in her movements carefully masked. _We need formula, diapers, blankets, clothes,_ she rattles off, before she promises she'll be quick and it'll all be okay. He's not sure if he's quite ready to believe that, with his brother curled up in his arms and already hoarse from his desperate wails. When she's gone, the glass wall holding his anxiety at bay cracks a little more while he paces.

"What's wrong with him? This isn't normal — he's _hurting_, Cas," he rants. His brother's limbs are rigid against his chest, Dean's shoulder wet from saliva and hot tears. He would strangle the angel just for the sake of having someone to strangle if he weren't at the very least so fucking relieved that Sam wasn't down there anymore (no, not Sam, Sammy; it was always _Sammy_ at this age). He glances at Cas, whose eyes are full of sympathy, while Sammy squirms and struggles and coughs. Dean recognizes the tenseness of muscles taut with pain, feels the small body under his arms stiffening with it. He's stitched up a Sam who had the same rigor in his limbs.

He wants to cry with the kid.

It's taking far too long, but Sammy's slowly calming in his rocking grip, choked hiccups hot against his neck. _Sleep, please,_ Dean thinks. _Just sleep. You need to sleep._ His little body sags wearily in his grip. He palms a warm head of soft hair. "What can you do? Do something for him, Cas. _Something._"

"I can't," Castiel says, remorseful, "It's not something that I can just take away. If it were a physical issue, something an angel could heal, I would heal it; I _would've_ healed it. This is something in his mind and soul that I can't just scrub out." And then, quieter: "This is The Cage. He doesn't remember anything of his life before, but his soul does."

He blinks back tears. "Shit... Shit. _Fuck_."

Castiel grows silent. He looks like a man on trial.

"I am sorry, Dean."

"Don't," he replies with quiet surrender, "Don't apologize for getting him out of there. This is better than what it could be, Cas. It really is." He strokes his hand over Sam's back, wordless for a few minutes in the dim kitchen. His brother's presence is like a blinding sun in the room. As much as he wants to mourn — mourn _again_, because this isn't the same Sam who fell, this is a new Sam, and he'll never get the old Sam back now — he can't regret having him here. Never. He'd rather Sam suffer here where he can make a difference than have an eternity-long nightmare under his feet. Somehow, he'll make this right, and it'll be better.

But there was nothing for Castiel to apologize for.

"I'll... Maybe Bobby can do something," he finally speaks. Funny how he wants to drink out of the whiskey bottle and chuck it far away at the same time. His voice cracks a little when he adds, "If anyone can help Sam, it's probably him." Castiel doesn't dispute that, so Dean considers it his best option, at this point. Maybe there's a spell, something to... age Sam back up, reverse the Hell damage. It's such a shot in the dark and he knows it'll likely turn up nothing, but Sammy deserves that they at least turn over every stone. He turns away and hums softly when his brother begins to stir again; Sam can't tease him for humming Bon Jovi or Journey, and that makes his guts churn realizing it. Sam doesn't even know who Dean is. Just some idiot maneuvering him against his shoulder, trying to remember motions he'd done decades ago. Trying to be that four-year-old again.

It shouldn't be this hard, but forty years of hell and thirty years of life make things complicated.

"It's okay, little brother. I gotcha."

Sam gurgles and it's not a precursor to crying, and for that he's eternally grateful.

When he turns to ask Castiel how the hell he'd managed to penetrate the barrier between this world and the Cage, he finds the angel gone. Prayers don't bring him back, so he just prays that he watch out for Sam at the very least. After what Sam had surrendered for this planet, he thinks his brother is entitled to at least _one_ angel watching over him. Considering his soul is allegedly a brutalized mess thanks to angels. Considering Sam probably never got any of his prayers answered from before his fall. Dean sure knows his never were.

He sits down, shell-shocked, on the couch, pulls one of his jackets over Sam's body, and waits for Lisa to come back.


End file.
